songs that sound like other songs

i have probably already mentioned this - my laptop cannot cope with opening all messages to check - but r.e.m.'s tongue / twentieth century zoo's quiet before the storm

"All I Want For Christmas Is You"
"Don't Stop Me Now"
Especially the intros

my brain just realized Olivia Rodrigo's "Vampire" is the mashup of Radiohead's "Creep" and ABBA's "The Winner Takes It All"

Someone else mentioned “Creep,” I barely hear that… (that said, I was psyched when a random dude on Mastodon said it evokes a Jim Steinman epic; thought my ears were the only ones making that link!)

Many on totp twitter recently pointing out that Robbie Williams' Let Me Entertain You sounds like D:Ream's Shoot Me with Your Love, which itself is clearly a Sympathy for the Devil/Loaded/Freedom '90 derive.

every song with the I-III-IV-iv progression is gonna sound at least a little like “creep”

xxp morrisp that was my immediate thought (wrt Steinman) except it was condensed into a 3 minute piece

I thought the place I ate lunch at today was playing a Taylor Swift song I hadn't heard but it turned out to be Jewel ("Standing Still"). Didn't realize how much Taylor's ballads sound like 2001 Jewel.

might be a stretch but the start of caetano veloso's 'de cara' (1972) is not wholly unlike a yessed-out 'roundabout' (1971)

in any case, what a fuckin album cover

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTdz4lQuSbo

They don't really share much that is concrete, but Swing Out Sister's Theme and The Orb's Spanish Castles in Space have very similar atmospheres imo

when the first verse of the Godzilland! (an educational children's anime based on chibi versions of the Godzilla kaiju) OP starts up, all I can hear is "Erotic City, can't you see? Fuck so pretty, you and me."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CipV9DBI72I

released a month later, "stairway to heaven" sounds like it bites its beginning from BEGGARS OPERA's "impromptu"

The melody (and harmony) in Robin Guthrie's Freefall remind me a lot of the Midnight Cowboy theme. I wonder if it's accidental.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpyR9VxRRUo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_c5r-bR2ys

This is going to sound mad but :

Problem Child - Rum Sweet
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4v5mby5JhU

Autechre - Milk DX
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQwz4Wz9xYc

did anyone else think this Sophie Ellis-Bextor sung song from the Mog Christmas TV animation sounds a bit like Born In A Prison by Yoko Ono

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCU3JJeqIB4

Suicidal Tendencies - I Saw Your Mommy
Puddle of Mudd - She Hates Me

one sucks

and Summer Nights

tell me more

ok i can't hear it in the ST song, just she hates me

Wes apparently leans into it now too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKES1omOnpM

Elvin Bishop - Fooled Around and Fell in Love
Huey Lewis and the News - If This is It

Suzanne Vega - "Luka" (1987) "If you hear something late at night..."
Slowdive = "40 Days" (1993) "If I saw something new..."

Madonna - 'Papa Don't Preach' / Suzanne Vega - 'Luka' / Slowdive - '40 Days'

― please login or register if you are (unregistered), Wednesday, January 14, 2015 6:42 PM (eight years ago)

lol

Steely to Jimmy to Billy: Everyone's Gone To the Movies/Margaritaville/My Life

Liz's verses on Cocteau Twins' Fotzepolitic always put me in mind of Chrissie's from the Pretenders' 2000 Miles

Is the baseline in Funkadelic's "I'll Stay" really similar to the baseline in The Beatles' "Dear Prudence"? It's kind of driving me nuts if that's not it.

yes

the charlatans' "here comes a soul saver" has a swirling riff that is very similar to the one in pink floyd's "fearless"

the opening of NIN's "Terrible Lie" and the beginning of the verse to Heart's "Never"

Whenever I hear Lankum's "The New York Trader", there's a recurring chord change that sounds so much like something else I know, and it's driving me crazy as to what it is.

It makes itslef felt at around the 2.36 mark when the cello and other instruments kick in.

In the song I can't place, it's the same kind of cello but playing this repeating 3-note pattern, strongly bowed, a little like Eleanor Rigby. My guess is that the song is from at least before 1994, possibly the eighties. Other than that, my brain cannot place it.

If that means anything to anyone, let me know.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWuZwci0TNs

(more like 2.40 in this video)

that’s the “neapolitan chord,” aka the bII, which resolves to the I. most of the song is in e minor, so when it goes to an f major (a chord that doesn’t neatly fit into the e minor or e major scales) it’s very creepy and dissonant, and even more so when it resolves to the major instead of the home minor key.

don’t think this is the example you’re thinking of, but radiohead's “pyramid song” makes heavy use of this same chord and resolution

maybe “because” by the beatles? not the exact same resolution but probably closer to the vibe

Dog Latin, have you considered the usual suspects for string parts? ELO, Eurythmics, Dream Academy?

dog latin, is it possible you're thinking of "macarthur park"?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ3XMOdOdKM

The verse in this song is very reminiscent of Miranda Lambert's "The House That Built Me"

you might be thinking of 0:47 here?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=070ecdv7vr0

heartspark dollarsisgn
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9Pop985sJQ
whats so funny bout love peace and understanding
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ssd3U_zicAI

I want to hear someone singing "This Is The Rhythm Of the Night" to the tune of "There Must Be An Angel"

Thanks for indulging my Lankum question, all. Interesting about the Neopolitan chord. Lemme look into the suggestions

Ye Mad Puffin, you are definitely onto something with Eurythmics / ELO. I am now listening to Annie Lennox's Diva album to see if it's something from that. It's definitely something my parents would have listened to around the turn of the 90s

It's a passing thing, but the intro of this Argentinian rock song reminds me of "Two Tickets to Paradise" by Eddie Money

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmZ54ziDlf0

was surprised not to find a knopfler writing credit for this one

jidenna bambi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0Eeju2aiGY
dire straits why worry
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_03uXQiz6eY

From the title, to the structure, to the chord changes, to the rhyme scheme, "Sad Cinderella" by Townes Van Zandt is a rewrite of "Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands". The choruses are a little different.

As was called out recently when I was mindlessly whistling Cygnus X-1: Book II (Hemispheres) by Rush…that one melodic line at 5:45 (this is but one of many occurrences in the song) that’s sung after the brief pause bares more than a passing resemblance to the chorus of Katy Perry’s “I Kissed A Girl” (which I had somehow never heard before).

the ascending melody at 0:57 in Minikon's Mishu Fantasy (2005) sounds like the pre-chorus of 'Get Lucky'. I like to think this pokes a hole in the "'Get Lucky'= god, 'Blurred Lines' = satan" dichotomy, but what are the odds that Daft Punk & co. ever listened to the Japanese edition of this little known twee IDM album?

shuggie otis's "strawberry letter 23" is the grinning grandpa to the dour self-serious REM dirge "half a world away"

Miley "Flowers" sounds like Santana ft. Rob Thomas

What I hear is...

I can by myself Flowers
And getting caught in the rain

what i hear is...nothing because I turn whatever apparatus I'm looking at/listening to off when that song comes on